World of Warcraft: Forever

On 13.09.2026, at BlizzCon 2026, Blizzard announced World of Warcraft: Forever — the very “Classic+” the developers had been promising in recent interviews. Right after the opening ceremony, the team held a round table about the project's future, where it became clear: this is not a cosmetic update to Classic, but a full-fledged third branch of WoW with its own content, its own rules, and plans stretching years ahead.

The beta opens on September 17, and the release takes place on November 5, 2026. You won't have to buy the game separately: access is granted by a regular subscription.

Forever's logic is built in reverse compared to Classic. By the time they launched, the classic servers were a game without mysteries: routes, tactics, and secrets had been picked apart long before the start. Forever brings back the unknown — here there is content no player has ever seen, and continuations of storylines the original WoW abandoned halfway through. No one intends to break the feel of Classic in the process, though: there will be no flying transport, no level scaling, and the developers refuse to make the game harder just for the sake of difficulty.

The team's guiding principle is “the world as the main character.” The value lies not in the race to the finish, but in the journey itself and in the people you meet along the way, which is why the social dimension remains the backbone of the project.

The level 60 cap is frozen forever: they don't plan to raise it, so that a leveled character, hard-earned gear, and learned professions don't lose their value with every new patch. This is not a seasonal experiment with a closing date — Forever is billed as a long story that will be expanded for years.

The Skyborn become a playable people. Their faction is not fixed: the character chooses the Horde or the Alliance, and part of the class lineup depends on that — the Horde unlocks the shaman, the Alliance the mage. Forever will also introduce combinations like the dwarf shaman and the Forsaken paladin.

The map gains four new territories:

• Mount Hyjal — a high-level location that continues the storyline of the Reign of Chaos finale: what happened after Archimonde's death. This is also where a new reputation faction and one of the new raids will appear.
• Riverdale — a territory east of the Burning Steppes, the Badlands, and the Redridge Mountains for characters of both sides at roughly levels 35–45. Orcs and humans, ogres and gnolls, murlocs and goblins all claw at these lands at once.
• Shen'Dralas — a region between Mulgore and the Barrens, built around ancient elven ruins.
• Isle of Zephras — a location assembled from motifs of the air element, Thunderous Fury, and the legacy of the Highborne.

Almost all the new instances are woven into the existing geography, so you won't have to travel to the other end of the world for them, and their spread across levels lets you enter them as you level up.

Dungeons

• Archaeological Dig Site — Wetlands, levels 28–29. Something strange is happening with the excavation itself, and it will be up to players to sort it out.
• The Sunken City — the ruins of a troll settlement near Stranglethorn Vale. Pirates, naga, and sea creatures have divided the territory among themselves, so it's not worth venturing here before level 35–40.
• Krol'dok Keep — a large dungeon in the new location of Riverdale, given over entirely to ogres of every stripe.
• The Prison Beneath Alcaz Island — the former place of imprisonment of Varian Wrynn, since taken over by naga and cutthroats from the Defias Brotherhood. Levels 48–53.
• Blackgullet Keep — levels 55–60, hordes of furbolgs and the source of their corruption.
• The Maker's Terrace — a complex in Un'Goro Crater, once raised by the titans. The developers compared the variety of its inhabitants to a trip to Jurassic Park. Levels 58–60.

Raids

The raid content is designed for groups of two sizes — 10 and 20 players — and it arrives alongside new class armor sets.

• Depths of the Barrow — an underground raid where the night elves kept the past's most dangerous criminals for ten thousand years. The mention of one infamous demon hunter hints clearly enough at who you'll have to face.
• Peak of Mount Hyjal — a continuation of the events at the roots of Nordrassil after Archimonde's defeat, with ghosts from the days of the Third War. It also works as a hub: inside it lie the entrances to three other raids.

Classes, Talents, and Items

Every single talent tree has been reworked. The main idea behind the changes is to remove boring passive percentage bonuses to stats in favor of talents that genuinely change how you play. Racial abilities follow the same logic: they've been rebuilt so that each people's bonuses are unique and not replicated by others.

PvP

All the classic battlegrounds stay in place, but new ones are added alongside them. The first one shown is the Islands of the Blackspear in a “Capture the Flag” format, where the Darkspear trolls clash with the forces of Theramore.

Camp

You can set up camp anywhere and anytime, and any ally of your faction can join it. The buff depends on the crafting skills of those gathered and applies to all participants at once. It isn't granted instantly: you'll have to sit by the fire for a while — just long enough to strike up a conversation with someone and, who knows, set off together. A mechanic invented literally for the sake of meeting people.

Legacy

Shared account-level progress: special challenges unlock bonuses for all characters on the account at once. The more actively you play different heroes, the more noticeable the effect becomes — a direct quality-of-life boost for those who love alts.

Transmogrification and Graphics

• Transmogrification comes to the game with a caveat: its display can be turned off client-side, so those who wish can see everyone around them in the gear they're actually wearing.

• Visually, the world has been brought up to modern standards: the water now has living currents, foggy areas have become volumetric, and moonlight breaks through the tree canopies.

• You can switch between modern and “vanilla” character models at any moment. What's more, the animation switches separately: the old one can even be applied to the new models.

Other Changes

• Crafting will get its own novelties, and along with them the world will see organizations you can build relationships with and earn reputation from.

• The principles of loot and reward distribution have been rebuilt from scratch — from stats on items to exactly what a player is rewarded for.

• Besides new battlegrounds, the team promises to improve the very mechanics of player-versus-player combat.

• Somewhere in the world lies yet another legendary item that never existed in the classic game.

• Mounted travel will be made more convenient, and gamepad controls will get official support.

It doesn't end with new zones: many familiar corners of Azeroth will gain new areas, characters, enemies, quests, dungeons, and raids. In total, the game will be filled with more than a thousand new quests spread across the entire level range, not just the “cap.”

• Dalaran — the barrier around the mages' city has been lifted, and you can finally get inside while magical restoration is underway there.
• Undercity — the surface above the Undercity has been reworked, and Horde characters at levels 15–25 help the Forsaken retake the ruins from the forces of the Scourge.
• Tunnels Beneath Ironforge — winding passages for the Alliance at levels 15–25, where the Dark Iron dwarves have settled in.

Fall 2026

• October 17–22 – beta testing with play up to level 30
• October 27 – early name reservation opens
• November 5 – launch

Winter 2026–2027

• December 9 – raids open: Depths of the Barrow (10 players), Peak of Hyjal (20 players), Onyxia's Lair (40 players)
• Launch of “hardcore” mode

Spring 2027

• 2 new raids for 10 and 20 players
• 2 new dungeons
• 2 new race and class combinations
• A new quest area
• A new PvP season

Summer 2027

• Rework of a major raid
• A new raid
• New open-world events
• 2 new dungeons
• A new PvP season
• Profession updates
• Updates to legacy content